


Can You Stop The Nightmares?

by Anonymous



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Anime, Caring, Dreams, Kindness, Levi/Eren Yeager-centric, M/M, Manga, Nightmares, Protection, Shipping, Top Levi (Shingeki no Kyojin), Tsundere, otaku, pairing - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-10
Updated: 2018-07-10
Packaged: 2019-06-08 12:28:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15243402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Eren has been plagued by vicious nightmares for quite some time now, he has been suffering sleepless nights lately which is affecting his work, Captain Levi is becoming fed up, or perhaps concerned? Can he stop Eren’s nightmares?





	1. Nightmares

The wall… the wall is gone… the titans are everywhere, there’s bloodshed, screaming and destruction everywhere Eren’s eyes go… Eren sees a familiar face amongst the wreckage…   
“Mom!” Eren runs straight ahead without thinking, in an instant… A titan stands before them… Eren stands covered in blood, his mothers blood. He screams his anguish and is suddenly facing another gruesome scene. Mikasa is trapped, Armin is trying to pull her from the rubble…   
The blood rains down… Eren is covered in Mikasa’s blood, Armins blood, his mothers blood. 

He falls to his knees, tears streaming down his face uncontrollably, he’s watching everyone die and he is helpless. The scene resets, from the beginning… It’s only more painful. Eren can’t bear it, he feels like he is going mad… the final scene approaches as it resets, Eren… Eren is the titan killing everyone, the one causing unrivalled destruction… The gruesome visage begins again, with Eren watching it all… He’s ripping apart their bodies, listening to their screaming, their last words and seeing the tears on their faces twisted in a horrific fear… Mikasa, Armin, Mom… 

Eren wakes up, sitting straight up with nausea causing a pitfall in his stomach… He is shaking, drenched in sweat and crying…   
“It was that dream again….why…why is it always that dream” Eren asks himself, he sits and pulls his knees to his chest as he cries… It’s getting worse. 

Generally that dream would only come now and then, lately it’s been every night… There’s no getting used to it, it’s only more painful every time he experiences it. But another arising problem, is the fact that the nightmares have forced his sleeping patterns to become shoddy… Sleep depravation, intense training, titan training and the average cleaning/chores around the compound have just been leading to an even greater exhaustion.   
The dark circles have not been complimenting his face either…But he can’t hold everyone back, least of all Captain Levi… 

Eren didn’t realize whilst cleaning the windows he began nodding off, he was quickly brought back to reality by the sound of Captain Levi making his rounds to check on everyone’s cleaning…The policy is that it is not clean unless it is cleaned to Captain Levi’s standard of minimum hygiene…Although most people would call his ‘minimum hygiene’ meticulous and maybe the acronym OCD floats around a bit. 

Eren went back over a few times making sure the window was cleaned to Captain Levi’s satisfaction when he went to continue on the rest of the windows… Eren was walking and trying to battle his dizziness, however, the dizziness won and Eren lost his balance. Still aware that he was under the captains’ gaze, he quickly stood up and picked up the spilt bucket of water, using this as an excuse to fetch more water. 

Captain Levi watched as Eren made his way out of the room, walking carefully to prevent falling over again… He hasn’t been himself lately, emotionally and physically he seems to be suffering from symptoms of sleep depravation, exhaustion and fatigue. 

The day ended and everyone was sitting around, eating and talking, Eren excused himself without eating and went back to his room. 

“Captain, something seems wrong with Eren” Hange said as she and Captain Levi watched him walk away  
“You’ve noticed as well, then?” Captain Levi replied   
“He’s been out of sorts, showing signs of exhaustion as well” Hange continued   
“I’ve noticed, he fell over from carrying a bucket of water” Captain Levi scoffed   
“I never expected anyone to keel over from cleaning a few windows” Levi continued   
“I think you should check up on him Captain” 

At Hange’s suggestion Captain Levi had decided to check up on Eren, can’t have him getting sick… can titans even get sick? He walked along to the corridor and eventually got to Eren’s door. He gave a simple two knock before opening the door.   
Before he entered, he could see Eren laying on the bed… Eyes closed, he was sleeping. Captain Levi had closed the door, leaving him to sleep. 

Eren opened his eyes, he didn’t know who came or why but he couldn’t have anyone inspecting his current state…He knew was it would be too evident that he wasn’t sleeping. Even if no one understood why he was hiding a simple matter such as not sleeping, it’s because Eren didn’t want to cause any more trouble for everyone… He has already caused them so much trouble. 

Eren lay awake atop his bed, the feelings of exhaustion has caused stress on his body as well as his mind. He closed his eyes for a few minutes…. not even five minutes had passed before he was gasping, concealing his scream…   
“That dream… That same damn dream” Eren said as he hit the wall out of frustration… not the best choice since he hit it as hard as he could. 

He flopped back onto the bed, the dark circles had gotten bigger, making him look like a raccoon. His hand throbbed with immense pain, he could rest his body, but he needed to sleep… Even though it felt like he would never sleep again.   
The entire night he continued the pattern of eyes close, terror, eyes open. 

Before he knew it, he was watching the sun rise, his eyes bloodshot and dark. His hands now emitting a dull ache, swollen, skinned and bruised were the current state of his hands. 

The sound of pans being hit together to announce the waking hours of everyone arose from the end of the hallway. Eren got dressed and was the first one at the table. There stood Hange happily hitting the pans calling everyone down for breakfast, as the Captain walked in, Eren said his good mornings to Hange and the Captain as he missed out on yet another meal and went straight to the cold showers. 

Eren still suffered from the pitfall stomach and nausea from his brief viewings of nightmares, he could stomach food… or even think about eating. Any biological signals of hunger were deterred by the sick feeling of his insides churning. Eren climbed into the shower, hoping the cold water would somewhat wake him up, after a couple of minutes, he was out and dressed… Ready for the day, or so he hoped anyway. 

Eren went back to the dining room, to find it empty… That ‘few’ minute shower seems to have lasted much longer than he expected.   
He hit his palm against his forehead “ Damn it, I’m losing time now… this is no good” Eren said to himself thinking he was alone.   
“You’re right, it is no good”   
Eren turned around startled   
“C-Captain” He said shocked, hoping he didn’t hear… what is he saying, the Captain heard him already. 

“Sit down” Captain Levi said as he walked into the dining area, holding a plate of food.   
Eren sat down at the strict tone he carried.   
As Eren sat, Captain Levi pulled up a chair next to him and set the plate on the table.   
“Captain I –‘ Eren was cut off by food in his mouth.   
He coughed and swallowed the bite, obviously being a bit agitated he snapped a question at the captain.   
“What are you doing? I’m not a child, I can feed myself” Eren exclaimed, his irritation clearly coming through his voice 

“Clearly you are a child. A child that cannot take care of himself” Captain Levi replied stone faced with a cold tone.   
Eren furrowed his brow and took the fork from Captain Levi.   
As he moved to grab the plate, he was stopped by a hand grabbing his wrist.   
“What’s with the unsightly state of your hands?”   
“Nothing…” Eren tried to pull himself free of Captain Levi’s iron grip.   
He continued his futile struggle but suddenly stopped at the sight of the captains face… his face was tinged with sadness.   
“Captain?”   
Captain Levi released his wrist and stood up, turning his back to walk away.   
“Make sure you finish what’s on the plate, I don’t need you dropping dead on me”   
Eren sat alone, slowly eating the food. Trying to keep it down, after the first couple of bites however, his body reminded him of his ferocious hunger from not eating since noon the day before. 

Eren set out to do his ‘work’ for the day, luckily it was a day off for normal training… But he still had many chores to do, cleaning, tending the horses, titan training… He sighed at his physical energy levels versus the work he had to do, although he couldn’t deny he was feeling better from eating something.   
He had finished most of the cleaning and had gone to tend to the horses.


	2. Resolution

Captain Levi was making his rounds, helping here and there with the work when he saw Eren from a distance tending to the horses.   
Levi looked down at his hand and spoke to himself… “I shouldn’t be going after the young ones… Especially one as annoying as him”   
As he glanced up from his hand he could see Eren falling over, thinking it was just another dizziness spell, he continued to watch and he noticed that Eren wasn’t moving… 

Feeling slightly stressed he walked over to the stables and looked down at Eren.   
Captain Levi clicked his tongue “This damn brat…” he said as he carried him back to his room. 

Darkness, destruction, bloodshed… It was all unfolding in front of Eren, all over again… He screamed and tried to fight, to no avail… If he wasn’t watching them die, he was the one killing them. 

Eren groaned and thrashed around violently, Captain Levi didn’t know how to react to what was happening, until he noticed the tears coming down Eren’s face, he stopped moving and continued to cry… In the midst of this all, he mumbled in the most heartbreaking voice “No more…”   
Captain Levi stood, his eyes widened… There was so much pain in his words, his tears, everything was painful to watch.   
He pulled up a chair and sat next to the bed, his hand reached out and gently covered Eren’s shaking hand.   
“It’s alright Eren” he said in a soothing voice. 

Eren opened his eyes, his spirit and mind now feeling tormented by the nightmares on replay… He looks beside him to see Captain Levi sitting on a chair next to his bed, quietly reading a book… Eren was still trying to remember what happened when he became aware of unfamiliar warmth over his hand. His eyes noticed a hand, resting on his own… The owner of the hand… sat in the chair, quietly reading. 

“So you’re awake?” Captain Levi said as he removed his hand from Eren’s.   
Eren could not understand why he felt the sudden compulsion to grab his hand, but none the less he did… Without completely being aware that it wasn’t just a thought, he had actually grabbed the captains hand. Eren feeling embarrassed let go.   
“I-I’m sorry Captain” He stammered slightly whilst trying to hide the blush that crawled onto his face. 

“It’s fine, so you haven’t been sleeping because of nightmares?”   
Eren looked up and met the captains gaze…   
“Yes…”   
“I see, what happens in these nightmares?” 

For the next while Eren sat and explained his nightmares to the captain…Vivid details as well as the changing perspective. Somewhere along the line, Eren began trembling just by remembering the sights he saw.  
“That won’t happen.” Captain Levi replied   
“Captain?”   
“I would cut the titan down and cut you out, before anything like that could happen… Perhaps it needed to be said after all, but Eren you can rely on me”   
Eren had stopped trembling and he smiled a defeated smile “You’re right, although this time was a bit different… It was still awful but at some point, I wasn’t so afraid because I didn’t feel alone…” 

After saying that out loud, Eren suspected he felt like that because the captain was holding his hand.   
“I won’t deny that I’m still afraid to sleep though” Eren said  
Captain Levi suddenly shut his book…  
“This is why I hate brats” He said as he removed his jacket and shoes, along with all of the harnesses that came with the uniform.   
Eren just looked on in confusion… 

Captain Levi climbed into Eren’s bed.   
“C-C-Captain, what are you doing!?” Eren asked, stammering and fumbling over his own words  
“You said it yourself, the nightmare wasn’t so bad because you didn’t feel alone… I’m sure you’re already aware that I was holding your hand.”   
Eren blushed at the captains words.

Captain Levi lay in Eren’s bed and pulled Eren closer to him, taking a firm grasp of his hand once again.   
Eren blushed even more furiously than before and kept his head down, after a moment of silence, Eren spoke.   
“Captain… will this really stop the nightmares?” He asked in a soft voice   
“Yes Eren… also, when we’re like this, I’d prefer if you called me by my name” Levi replied in a gentle voice, almost trying to reassure and soothe Eren. 

Eren was already in Levi’s arms and holding his hand, he moved to snuggle in a bit more with him.  
“A-alright Levi…” Eren said, his voice slightly faltering on the unfamiliarity to using his name alone without ‘captain’ 

He laid and listened to the rhythmic beating of Levi’s heart, the sound had calmed him down and he began to fall asleep… 

Levi continued to hold Eren and listened to the quiet sound of his breathing, indicating he had fallen asleep. Levi continued to hold him, as if he were the most delicate and precious treasure…He planted a gentle kiss on Eren’s forehead.  
“I’m here for you Eren, I’ll protect you… even from the nightmares…” 

The warm morning light intruded in the room, waking Levi as his eyes strained against the light and deftly adjusted. When he was fully awake, he looked down to see Eren still sleeping peacefully, Levi had also noticed that he still held Eren’s hand in his own, he also became aware of Eren’s free hand, clutching to his shirt. 

Eren’s eyes gently opened, he felt so much better than he had been… He was greeted by Levi still holding him.   
“I didn’t have any nightmares capt— Levi” Eren exclaimed happily “Thank you” Eren said as he rested his head back onto Levi’s chest.   
Levi ran his fingers through Eren’s hair as they continued to enjoy this simple comfort until the banging of pans alerted them it was time to get up. 

Reluctantly they both got out of bed, Eren began getting the rest of his uniform on, as Levi stood silently and watched Eren, he felt relieved that his bright eyes and usual self had returned… Levi smiled to himself… 

From now on, Eren would never have anymore nightmares nor will he sleep alone…


End file.
